1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates generally to architectural hardware, and in particular to a fastening device for curtain wall units.
2. Description of Related Art
Glass curtain walls have been widely used as the outer wall of building. In recent decades, point-supported glass curtain wall has been widely used in large public facilities due to its high security, good light transmission, nice ornamentation, variety of structure, convenience for maintenance, high technology, and so on.
During the assembly of one type of the point-supported glass curtain wall, holes are generally defined on the edge portions of the glass curtain wall, and connecting elements are inserted into the holes to joint the glass curtain wall units which are then coupled to a supporting structure on the building by claw-shaped connectors. Thus, it is necessary to define holes on the four corners of the glass curtain wall unit respectively in order to carry out the assembly. As is well known, the holes on the friable glass should be generated by a special device, which is of relative low efficiency and also is a waste of time and effort, and the glass strength is reduced, easy to be broken and may raise security problems due to the holes on the four corners.
One solution that deals with the above problems is to provide a fastening device to clamp the curtain wall units. Referring to FIG. 1, a typical fastening device includes a front clamping plate, a rear clamping plate fixed to the front clamping plate, and a support plate located between the front clamping plate and the rear clamping plate. The curtain wall units are located between the front clamping plate and the rear clamping plate. However, this type of fastening device still has many disadvantages, for example, when the curtain wall moves horizontally or rotates a few degrees caused by wind load or shock, the contact surface between the glass curtain wall and the support plate will become a line (as shown in portion A in FIG. 1), such that the glass curtain wall may crack or be damaged due to the stress concentration.
Therefore, a fastening device which overcomes the described limitations is desired.